Your Calendar is Your Time Budget
I wrote a book about personal finance (Personal Finance in a Public World) so I know all about budgeting money.
But, maybe I don’t know enough about budgeting life’s most precious commodity: time. I just had a birthday and every time I circle the sun again I feel like I’ve lost some time - or mismanaged what I had.
This entry is going to fly by and I hope it is a good use of your time, but honestly I will probably never know. Even if you wanted to tell me what you think, it could take years before you determine if I taught you something, you learned it, and you implemented it.
There is certainly nuance in evaluating the use of your time.
Doing It Well
Somehow, I managed to quote LL Cool J in a positive impact blog. If you’re not sure what I am talking about, see his hit song, “Doin’ It”. It could easily be a mic drop moment and the end of E-Impact 98 if I were representing Queens or was raised out in Brooklyn. I digress. Not only have I always wanted to say that, I really should or else you’ll digress to another blog.
Budgeting your money is a lot different from your time. In our current world monetary system (fiat, for more on a potential shift to decentralized blockchain based money, check out chapter 8 of my book, Personal Finance in a Public World), it’s pretty easy for most people to determine the value of the money they have. People may struggle to budget, but they can easily measure their effectiveness.
Time is different. People struggle to budget it and it’s equally easy to count but it’s terribly hard to measure. Yes, counting is different than measuring.
The only thing that we have is the ability to “do it well”. Spend your time doing the things that are meaningful and impactful.
This is impactmaking.
Changing the World
I heard it once and I’ve repeated it numerous times.
You may not change the world, but you can change the world for one.
In the context of time, this is foundational to your approach. If you attempt to measure your time by the popularity or “size” of your work, you’re bound to be disappointed. It’s not possible for most people to change the world and it’s impossible to do it repeatedly.
Not all hard work is visible like construction.
The most famous philanthropists, business people, and inventors are generally remembered for a single life’s project. They work extremely hard to do something great whether we realize it or not. There are no overnight world changers.
This section is not to deter you. In fact, it’s to motivate you. Listen to one of my favorite songs “World Changers” by Audio Adrenaline for a deeper understanding of why I think simple habits and actions are what truly change the world (see the service project in the video). Ironically, I wrote another entry, E-Impact 62, about the quality and quantity of time that mentioned Spoke Folk. This is the ministry that my wife and I met on and how I found the song.
To prematurely wrap things up for the second time, the answer to better time management is remixing LL Cool J and Audio Adrenaline music.
Changing Yourself
The real secret to changing the world is looking inward.
I’ve published plenty of entries in this blog with specific steps as to how you should focus on the needs of the world with the intent of making a positive impact. Maybe I’ve erred. I believe in those processes or else I would not have documented. Yet, I realize that before you can make your best impact, you have to know yourself very well.
This entry then is somewhat of a prequel to its counterpart entries. This is a chance to take a step back - perhaps destress a bit from chasing external change.
I can’t teach you a “hack” for measuring the quality of your time or tell you exactly how to budget it perfectly. But, I can tell you that spending your time on things that fit your personality, skills, and interests is valuable.
I don’t think there is any way to completely avoid personal “mission drift”. Mission Drift, by Peter Greer and Chris Horst, is a popular book in the non-profit world. I will apply it directly to each of our lives. A strong purpose is essential in the impact space. Listen back to Molly Stillman on Speaking of Impact episode 14 for some tips on this.
Have a convicting purpose, but even if you do…it’s not everything. There will be times that you experience some drift. If you’re anything like most people in the digitally advanced world, you’re at least a bit over stimulated. This is part of the reason I wrote the book I referenced earlier. Even the most focused people are affected by a few of those stimulation sources. They catch you at your weakest moments and pull you off course. That’s okay. It’s important though, that you get back on track. And the way you do this is to monitor how you spend your time - to budget it if you will.
Intentional Spending
I always tell people who are looking to improve their personal financial situation to spend money. They often look at me like I am crazy. They might say, “Bob, I’m asking you (or paying) you to help me save money. Why are you telling me to spend it? I already do!”. Valid point, I know.
The truth is that people have a spending problem, not a saving problem. The same goes for their time.
I tell people to spend money on the most important things in their life first. They need to pay down debt, pay bills, build an emergency fund, and find inexpensive things that bring them consistent joy. Yes, spend money on some non-necessities. This item on the list of what to spend on enables you to break free from the chains of desire. It satisfies you so that you are less tempted to spend on things that the world or advertisers tell you is important.
I’m not saying if you like cars then you should buy multiple Lamborghinis. Find things that have a limited expense that you can spend money. For me, it’s fantasy sports. I spend a little bit of money every year on my fantasy teams. It gives me entertainment, competition, joy, and a way to destress.
Let’s apply spending on the important things concept to your calendar. Prioritize the essentials and the things, as I mentioned above, that fit your personality, skills, and interest. I know it’s a must for me to spend time with my wife, working, and keeping up with our house (this includes Kobe, our needy cat). These are all essentials. On top of that, I prioritize my time with my fantasy teams and watching/listening to certain sporting events. Outside of trips, whether for business or pleasure (you could argue that those are priorities in the schedule), those things are always part of my time spend. I know they are a valuable use. I can’t give you a measure of how helpful it is for me to watch the Super Bowl (actually watched it stuck on a plane this year, long story) but I know it’s good.
I am intentional about the things I spend my time (and money) on first.
Flexiblity
All this information seems full-proof. All you have to do is spend your time doing the things that are fun and you’ll live a great life. This is hardly the case.
The fact is, we all have to be flexible. Your financial budget has an emergency fund so that you can cover an unexpected expense. As a purpose driven professional and impactmaker, things are going to come up. Flex time in your calendar is essential. It’s your time emergency fund.
I was once prone to being guilty of cramming my schedule. Since I have fixed that, life is much different. I had to change myself.
Second to the priorities (we are filing the “joy spend” under priorities), the flex time is essential. This is an amazingly valuable use of your time. It’s like insurance but even better. It covers you in case of emergency but the bonus is that you don’t lose the time. Your medical insurance or life insurance costs you money that you are not likely to get back (there are some insurance policies that offer money back in certain stations). Your flex time can be used for something else if nothing comes up.
I don’t recommend it (at least to start) but you can even have something non-essential scheduled during that time if nothing comes up. The problem with this practice is that things don’t normally come up and you can easily make your flex time something else. Be sure to avoid this.
The Model Week
One of the greatest practices I learned from my previous employer (prior to founding Initiate Impact) was having a model week. This is my time budget.
It applies beyond just my work. It keep me on track and helps me to prioritize that my time is as valuable as it can be.
We are currently in an inflationary financial environment. We can control how much money we save or spend but we have very little effect on how much our money is actually worth. Milk was eighty-three cents per gallon in 1950, $2.48 in 1995, and who knows today - it could be $15.00 if you buy grass-fed (I should produce an entry about this).
We may not be able to measure it clearly but we can have a much greater effect on the value of our time. There is no central bank of time that can make bunch of it to avoid a recession or prop-up the “time market”. We value it.
A model week is a well filled calendar.
This is great but it generates some pressure. Not only do we get to value it, we have to value it.
A model week is a visual tool for you to see how you spend your time on a weekly basis. It should be color-coded and easy to reference. Mine includes the priorities in red and the flex time in black. It’s engrained in my head at this point and I only have to look at it when I need to make adjustments (which still happens).
The Impactmaker Movement needs us to raise the value of our time. We can change the world simply by changing ourselves - our time.
I hope this entry has “flown by” and was a good use of your time. You may not know it for a while. In the meantime (see what I did there?), keep budgeting and spending your time intentionally.